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Weakened by SARS
But Not Defeated

By

Barbara D. Phillips

Updated Aug. 6, 2003 12:01 a.m. ET

New York

SARS has abated in Toronto, after sickening about 250 people in that city and killing 42. The World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control took Toronto off their advisory lists early last month. But the side effects of the outbreak are still being felt a two-hour drive away in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario.

The picture-postcard-pretty town, a short distance from Niagara Falls and Buffalo, has had not a single case of the virus, but such is the power of fear that its Shaw Festival, which began its 42nd season this April and runs until Nov. 30, has seen ticket sales decline 15%, or about $788,000 (all figures have been converted to U.S. dollars), over this period last year. This at a theater festival that derives 77% of its revenue from ticket sales to its 11 plays, which this year include George Bernard Shaw's "Misalliance" and "Widowers' Houses," Betty Comden and Adolph Green's "On the Twentieth Century," Sean O'Casey's "The Plough and the Stars" and Brian Friel's "Afterplay."

Nationwide, lost tourism ascribed to SARS is projected this year in the hundreds of millions of dollars by the Canadian Tourism Commission, while other estimates in the press have ranged as high as $1.4 billion in Toronto alone.

I am, I confess, one of the cowardly tourists who gave the Shaw -- and Ontario's Stratford Festival of Canada, another frequent stop on my theater-going calendar -- a skip this spring and summer, despite being a regular the past several years. I've just begun thinking about a visit to one or both next month, perhaps with a stop in Toronto somewhere along the way. And Canada, desperate to make up for lost revenue, is hoping to nudge the undecideds like me.

Last Wednesday, for example, a subsidized 11-hour benefit concert designed to revive the ailing tourism industry with a shot of international publicity drew a healthy crowd of about 450,000 Canadian and American fans to a former military airfield in Toronto. They couldn't resist the bargain $16.50 tickets and a chance to hear not only the Rolling Stones but such performers as AC/DC, Justin Timberlake, and Dan Aykroyd and Jim Belushi's blues band. Among the Canadian acts was the Guess Who, a veteran group best known in the States for its 1970 hit "American Woman," which features such decidedly off-message lyrics as "American Woman, stay away from me."

That song was sung at last week's concert, but anti-American sentiment wasn't really on show, what with Canada ponying up a reported $2.45 million, the province of Ontario $1.4 million and brewer Molson, the chief sponsor, $4.55 million to lure Yanks and others back to Toronto. (About 72 cents of each ticket sold through Ticketmaster will be split between a scholarship fund for health-care workers and a relief fund for hospitality-industry workers hurt by the downturn SARS wrought.) And according to the Associated Press, Mr. Aykroyd, the concert's Canadian-born master of ceremonies, waved a Canadian flag and shouted: "Hey Pennsylvania, hey there New York state, Connecticut, Indiana, Michigan! We don't see you enough! And you don't see us enough. No borders! No borders!"

But the Shaw Festival isn't waiting for theatergoers foreign and domestic to flock to it now that SARS fears have eased. On July 21, after an infusion of about $285,000 from the Ontario Ministry of Tourism and Recreation, the Shaw for the first time in its history loaded up two vans bearing brochures and tickets, and sent them off on simultaneous 20-day tours in search of buyers on both sides of the U.S.-Canada border.

One began its quest in Toronto and by Saturday will have taken in seven other Ontario cities. The other started its roadtrip in New York City and ends its journey in Lansing, Mich., with seven Eastern and Midwestern U.S. cities in between. There are tie-in promotions, with local radio stations giving away about $35,000 in theater tickets, hotel rooms and winery tours. The remaining stops are in London, Ontario (today and tomorrow); Detroit (today through Friday); Windsor, Ontario (Friday and Saturday); and Lansing (Saturday). More specific information can be found at the festival box office -- (800) 511-SHAW.

Odette Yasbeck, Shaw's public relations director, said in a phone interview: "The city of Toronto, the province of Ontario and the rest of the country were seemingly all placing ads. We at the little Shaw Festival had to look at what to do to increase awareness of our offerings. So we created these mobile box offices to take our message directly to our key markets." After mentioning overall sales in the past few weeks that have "ebbed and flowed," Ms. Yasbeck put a positive spin on the results so far. In New York City, where the Shaw Festival is not well known to the average theatergoer, "we didn't sell tickets, per se, but we did see a lot of interest in our brochures and other materials," she noted. "The message is getting out. And closer to home, our plan seems to be working quite well. Not only are people buying tickets from the vans but mentioning the visits when they place orders by phone."

Michigan and Ontario are also the targets of the Stratford Festival's latest print-advertising and direct-mail efforts, which launched June 21 -- especially previous ticket buyers who live an easy drive away. Kelley Teahen, media manager of the festival, which is two hours southwest of Toronto, said in a phone interview that about $285,000 of the funding came from the province and $72,000 from the festival's regular marketing budget. (Normally the festival, which will have presented 16 plays by the time its 51st season ends Nov. 23, spends most of its marketing dollars in the months before a season begins in April.)

She estimates that the festival lost $1 million at the box office during the weeks of the SARS advisories and notes that no one became ill in Stratford, Ontario, during the outbreak. "Since the new campaign we've seen a return to normal -- and some weeks better than normal -- levels of ticket sales. But we still have half a season to go."